


The Michigan Lighthouse

by Mab (Mab_Browne)



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast), The Sentinel (TV)
Genre: Crossover, Gen, M/M, Mental Coercion, Supernatural Elements, a random prompt generator made me do it, gertrude pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:07:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28257414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mab_Browne/pseuds/Mab
Summary: Gertrude meets a chatty young man while travelling in the USA. It's inconvenient. She has things to be getting on with.
Relationships: Jim Ellison/Blair Sandburg
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13





	The Michigan Lighthouse

**Author's Note:**

> ThisBlueSpirit threw out offers to put names you gave her through a random pairing and prompt generator. There were several interesting options but the one that grew this story was Gertrude Robinson/Blair Sandburg, confession under the influence, and lighthouse. Add this to the annals of my weird crossovers.
> 
> There's a bit of explanation about the Sentinel aspects for anyone unfamiliar with that show in the end notes, but they're spoilery for the story. Your choice.

“This is crazy. I got in. You obviously got in. So why can’t we get out again?”

Gertrude stared out at the view from the balcony. It was part of a glorious 360 degree view, as had been the revolution of the light here, despite the lighthouse being attached to the mainland. It had spread its blinking, revealing light over the town as well as the sea back in the day.

“Well I got in because I enquired after a key,” she said dryly. The man shrugged, a little embarrassed but not that much. He’d made glib apologies about curiosity, interesting looking building, always wanted a look inside a lighthouse. Curiosity killed the cat, and more than one researcher if it came to that, and here was a highly inconvenient young man. “As to why we can’t open the door again, it’s quite the mystery, but I presume that an elderly lock has something to do with it.”

He stared glumly over the railing, where they’d climbed back up to contemplate the possibility of help, and gazed up the long concrete pier that led back to the mainland. “So do you think someone will notice we’re here?”

“Eventually, I’m sure.”

“Yeah, it’s the eventually I’m wondering about. I mean, I’m here with a friend, he’ll start looking for me soon enough and he’ll kid me forever about getting stuck here if he’s the one who finds me. Especially since it’s not the first time I’ve been in this situation.”

Gertrude raised an eyebrow. “Do you make a habit of being trapped in places?”

He grinned at that. “Not on purpose but it just seems to happen that way. At least there are no bombs this time round.”

Not by one wince or flinch did Gertrude reveal the existence of the C4 in her sturdy carry-bag.

“That does sound a comfort,” she said. “Have you come across a lot of bombs?”

The grin grew wider. “More than my fair share. Life’s like that sometimes. I’m sorry, I’m forgetting my manners.” He extended one hand. “Blair Sandburg.”

“Gertrude Robinson,” she said in her turn, and they shook hands. He had a good handshake – she wouldn’t have expected the dominance display of a hard grip, not given her appearance and the circumstances, but neither was he overly gentle. She appreciated it.

“So, Gertrude, you’re English.” Which was what nearly every man and woman she’d met in America said to her, swiftly followed by, ‘I love your accent.’

“I am indeed.”

“So what you doing here? Admiring the Great Lakes?” This one at least did not love her accent.

She swallowed down an impulse to blurt out the truth. This building was as much an influence as she’d feared it might be.

“I’m interested in 19th century architecture. This building was built by a disciple of Robert Smirke – the influences are in the construction rather than design, of course. Smirke designed buildngs rather grander than lighthouses, but if you know what you’re looking for…”

She paused, aware she’d said too much, and very much hoping that he wouldn’t ask anything about what precisely might be found.

“So you’re on vacation? I don’t know anything about architecture, but that sounds cool, just following a passion.”

“One must have an interest in one’s old age,” she said, playing up the frail, cut-glass tones for all she was worth. “And you?” If there was to be any sort of sacrifice to this building, it was not going to be her.

“I’m here with Jim. My friend.” She tilted her head, all encouragement. There was a tiny hesitation that made her quite sure that his friend was perhaps more than a friend, but that was none of her concern. “We’re taking a break.”

“Oh?” she said kindly, a pleasant stranger to another person thrown into each other’s ambit by embarrassing circumstance.

“It’s been a tough year, we just wanted to reconnect…” And just like that, she felt the shift around her, the listening stones, and all she had to do was make the occasional encouraging noise while it all poured out of him – the fact that, yes indeed, his Jim was something more than a friend, the tough year, rambling revelations that he barely knew he was making about the wondrous nature of his more than a friend - and that was actually interesting to Gertrude. Sentinels. She forgot sometimes that the Fears weren’t all that the world was. But they were certainly all too large a part.

Blair’s uncontrolled speech, not even a statement really, was knowledge, but not intrinsically the kind that made a good meal for Beholding, even if this young man was more than half attached to the Eye already. She recognised the type. They had to know, even when it cost them, no matter what it cost them. And she hadn’t even needed to be the conduit. She was nothing more than a witness. Someone to hear the echo of his tale in the concrete and steel of the old lighthouse, its walls heavy with anticipation.

It all wound down eventually. They’d sat on the balcony floor while Blair told his tale. He now sat in silence, and Gertrude suspected he wasn’t entirely aware of just how much he’d said, how long he’d spoken, the passionate and personal convictions and doubts he’d shared with a complete stranger.

She heard a man’s voice on the wind. Blair jerked out of his lassitude and scrambled to his feet to look over the balcony. He waved vigorously and called out, “Jim! Over here!” Then he turned back and saw Gertrude, and the smile was wiped from his face. His face paled, and he swallowed.

“I… what did I… He took a step towards Gertrude and shook his head. His eyes, very blue in his shocked, white face, met Gertrude’s with sudden, desperate pleading. “I shouldn’t have told you all that. I really shouldn’t have. Don’t… don’t let him know I told you all that. Don’t tell _anyone_ I told you all that.” He looked utterly confused and more than a little sick.

To know everything he knew, and know he shouldn’t share it; to clearly fear that sharing it was a betrayal of his friend, and to not understand why he’d done it; to fear his friend, his lover’s, discovery of it all. The air around her was finally heavy with satisfaction, and she put her hand out to him with genuine pity. She could afford that, at least.

“I won’t say anything to him,” she said. “We’d best go down stairs.”

They walked down the narrow staircase, to find the man, Jim, standing in the open doorway.

“How did you do that?” Blair demanded.

“I… opened the door?” Jim said. He was tall, and handsome in his way – long-jawed, and with narrowed eyes that softened as he spoke to Blair.

“It was stuck. We couldn’t open it. Uh. Jim. This is Gertrude, from England. She likes old buildings.” Blair thrummed with tension, which lessened slightly as Jim nodded pleasantly at her. Those Sentinel ears hadn’t been listening to Blair’s miserable plea at the top of the lighthouse.That Sentinel nose wasn’t paying attention to Gertrude’s bag, wisely left at the top of the building.

“I hope you’re having a good vacation.” Jim turned back to Blair. “We’re going to be late for dinner, Chief. Since you got ‘stuck’.”

“Yeah, sorry. Sorry.”

“You had a good walk?”

Blair nodded, and looked back the once at Gertrude. “Enjoy your visit here,” he said with rote courtesy. She nodded and watched as the two men wandered back towards the town. Then she stepped through the open door out into the fresh air. Even out here, she could hear the echoes of satisfaction, and the murmur of stories told, trapped in the stone. Once, when this lighthouse had been operational, when its light had spread out over the ocean, how many men and women had seen that beam flash in their eyes, and dreamed of other’s lives, other’s mistakes, other’s confessions?

She contemplated her wasted journey here, before her eyes were caught by the billow of spider web that was caught between the bevelled ornamental rim that ran the circumference of the building and its sturdy concrete wall. She could hardly lay her C4 now. Those two men would remember this place, remember her, Blair especially.

And of course there’d no doubt been a morsel for the Web today, dropped from the Eye’s table. Angrily, she caught the spider silk across her fingers and smeared it against the rough concrete.

“You’re really not as amusing as you think you are, you know.” There was no answer but then, she hadn’t expected one.

**Author's Note:**

> For any TMA readers kind enough to look at this - a sentinel is a person gifted with highly developed senses of sight, hearing, taste, smell and taste. Think X-Men's Wolverine without the animalistic traits or the healing factor. In the show The Sentinel itself, Jim doesn't want people to know about his senses for both personal and professional reasons, and the finale revolves around the unwitting reveal of those senses; there's twenty years of fic and fanon about the consequences of said finale. Suffice to say that Blair's 'statement' within the lighthouse walls is potentially damaging to his relationship with Jim and not something he'd normally reveal to anyone he didn't know very well indeed.


End file.
